The present invention relates to the aircraft braking art and, in particular, to an aircraft automatic braking system which applies predetermined braking to the aircraft such that the aircraft tends to stop at a selected point on the runway.
Prior to the present invention, aircraft autobrake systems controlled airplane deceleration to one of several aircraft deceleration settings. Thus, if a pilot wished to stop the airplane at a certain point on the runway, for example at a runway exit, it is unlikely that the autobrake system would provide a deceleration setting that matched the stopping distance to the selected runway stop point. The pilot's choice, then, was to select one of the deceleration settings, and, if the airplane was decelerating too quickly, disarm the autobrake system and use pedal braking to avoid stopping short of the desired point. If, however, the airplane was decelerating too slowly, the pilot would again need to revert to pedal braking to increase deceleration to stop the airplane at the selected stopping point. Both of the above conditions result in uneven deceleration that is apparent to the airplane passengers.